Wood BOE plans to discuss meetings policy

December 11, 2012

PARKERSBURG - The Wood County Board of Education will discuss the rules for conducting meetings during a regular meeting at 6:30 p.m. today at the administration office, 13th and Plum streets.

The meeting is open to the public.

The only item on the agenda is Policy 1120.2: Rules and Regulations Governing the Wood County Board of Education and the Rules Governing the Conducting of Board Meetings.

The board was forced to postpone a meeting on Nov. 27 due to the lack of a physical quorum. Only two board members, President Tim Yeater and member John Marlow, were in attendance for the meeting, while board members Lawrence Hasbargen and Jim Fox attended via conference call.

The school board's policy requires at least three members to be physically present to have a quorum. Yeater later said he had forgotten member Tad Wilson was scheduled to be out of town that day.

The meeting was postponed until Nov. 28.

At today's meeting, the board members "are going to discuss the events that took place when we had to postpone a meeting because we did not have a quorum present at the site," said Sue Woodward, assistant superintendent of school services. "They want to make it clear as to why they did what they did."

While initially drafting the policy several years ago, the school board had discussed allowing for non-attending members participating via conference call to count toward the quorum, but officials at the state level recommended the board require a physical quorum.

In other business, the board will hold a retreat from 9-3 p.m. Thursday at the West Virginia Secondary School Activities Commission in Parkersburg. The meeting will consist of central office administration presentations with a discussion time and executive session scheduled after.

Each administrator will have about 15 minutes to present information on their department to the board.

The topic for the afternoon's executive session is listed as "progress on superintendent's goals." No vote is scheduled.